Auggie's backstory AU
by Disgarded
Summary: These are a few snippets of a possible backstory for Auggie surrounding the time of his injury, as seen from Joan's perspective.


_(These are from an Auggie origins story I was thinking about writing, that would've become AU as soon as the show revealed Auggie's actual past.)_

"Should be minimal security at the compound, Auggie. Get your guys in and out with as quick as you can."

"Copy that." (Auggie's voice carried over the line as he gave some final instructions to his group. When a mission had come up involving Iraq, Auggie had been the obvious choice. Having worked in Special Forces before being recruited to the CIA, he had all the necessary experience, and, they'd managed to find most of his old team for this mission.)

Joan ended the call and began the wait as Auggie's group went radio silent a mile outside the compound. She kept watch over them via a far away grainy picture the satellite gave her on her own screen.

A few minutes later radio silence was broken when a call came in from Auggie's team - someone was calling for an abort. The sound on the other line could only be described as chaotic. There were sounds of gunfire and shouting.

* * *

><p>The audio feed went dead suddenly, and it was a full hour before she was able to get through to anyone at the base Auggie had been deployed from. Even then, all they'd been able to tell her was that they could confirm the team had run into something unexpected, and they had sent an extraction team.<p>

Two long hours later she received a call from her contact at the base. The mission had been compromised, Auggie was enroute to hospital in Germany with serious injuries, and the intel they'd been going after had been retrieved. A bitter victory.

* * *

><p>Despite his injuries, Auggie was stable and it was very little time before Joan was able to arrange a transfer back into the United States. Not that the military hospitals overseas weren't great - they were - but she assumed Auggie would want to be closer to home, and for her own purposes, having him closer would make her job a little easier.<p>

They told her he'd been in and out of consciousness for a couple of days, but the last couple times he'd woken up he'd been pretty lucid.

She made her way through the quiet hall. It was late - almost ten - but she'd only just left the office. Once she'd heard that Auggie was lucid, she'd wanted to come see him.

She paused in the doorway, taking in the sight of him on the hospital bed in the dim room. Even in the low light she could tell he was pale. Other than that, though, he didn't look all that injured. No dramatic bandages wound around his head, no limbs in casts up in slings. If not for the equipment and the sterility of the room, she could almost imagine he was only napping.

She entered the room, letting her heels clack on the tiled floor. She figured if he were deeply asleep the noise was unlikely to wake him, but if he were just dozing, it'd be enough to alert him to her presence.

Sure enough, she watched as he stirred. "Joan?" (Nurses didn't have high heels.)

She reached out and covered one of his hands. "Don't sound so surprised. I told you I'd be by tonight. How're you feeling?"

He squeezed his eyes shut briefly as if in pain, before returning them to where they'd been - vaguely focused (blearily) in the vicinity of her left shoulder. When he finally spoke his voice was soft and slight gravely from disuse.

"I've got the mother of all headaches, my chest hurts like a bitch… and oh, I can't see. Other than that, I'm great."

She snorted softly. She'd already heard from the doctors that he was very lucky to be alive. Not only had the blast blinded him, it'd knocked him back into some rocks and given him quite the concussion - never mind the broken rib or two, and other various sprains and strains.

"How soon until you get more pain meds?"

He shrugged with a wince, and brought the heal of the hand she wasn't holding to rub at his eyes. "Don't know… what time's it now?"

"Around ten."

He snorted this time - bitterly. "AM or PM?"

"PM. But I'm guessing you don't even remember the last time you got pain meds." she said, reaching for his call button to summon a nurse.

A small, disembodied voice came through the tiny speaker near the bed saying someone would be right in.

"You gonna make them drug me up? It'll just put me to sleep again, y'know."

"Nope. I'm not gonna make them do anything. If you want something for the pain, you'll get it. If not, you can be brave and have a headache all night. Up to you, Auggie."

He groaned softly and rubbed his eyes again. "Is this my official debrief? 'Cause I should probably be awake for that."

"No, just a visit. We'll worry about all that later."

The nurse entered then, interrupting their conversation. "Try not to rub your eyes, Mr. Anderson."

Auggie gave another bitter snort. "Huh. Yeah, I'd hate to damage them. Might not be able to see…"

The nurses tutted while she fiddled with his I.V. "Would you like something for the pain now, or after your visit?"

"After."

"Auggie, it's fine. I'll be coming back, you know."

"After. I'd like to be coherent just a little longer." He crossed his arms. "I don't need you to babysit, Joan."

"Please, Auggie. If you needed a sitter, it wouldn't be me." The nurse left, and the room fell silent for several beats.

Joan squeezed his hand. "Auggie, I want you to know that I'm here for you. We all are. You'll get through this."

Auggie leaned back and directed his eyes upwards, almost as if he could still stare at the ceiling. He sighed. "This isn't going to get better, Joan."

He stopped and swallowed a lump in his throat. "It's never getting better."

Joan considered her agent. He was one of the best she had, and frankly, one of her favorites. She'd lost count of the number of missions she'd been his handler for over the last couple of years. Still, as much as she longed to reassure him and make him see that they'd do whatever it took to keep him, she knew that it was too soon for him. And, she'd never been very good at being comforting anyway.

She settled for squeezing his hand again. "Get some rest. I'll be back tomorrow."

* * *

><p>Joan sat in her car outside the rehab center for a minute putting her thoughts together in a way she rarely had the luxury of doing at work. Ops gone bad were always difficult, but when an agent was injured it was even worse. Worse still, when the agent was one of her best and the injury was permanent. Somewhere inside the building in front of her, Auggie was dealing with all this - desperately trying to figure out how to put his life back together. The fact that many of them at the DPD had been left reeling as well was something he probably hadn't even thought about. Nor would she have expected him to. No, right now their jobs - her job - was to support Auggie in any way possible. The effect this was having on everyone else was not something he needed to be concerned with right now.<p>

With that in mind, she took a deep breath, and put on her game face. He might not be able to see it anymore, but it would remind her that she didn't have time to indulge her own feelings right now. Auggie needed her.

* * *

><p>Joan paused in the doorway in disbelief. The scene in Auggie's room was not at all what she had been expecting. The bedsheets had been torn off the bed and tossed onto the floor along with what seemed like just about every article of clothing Auggie owned. Dresser drawers hung half-open, their contents either hanging loose, or completely missing. There were random items strewn all over the room - she noticed the flowers someone had sent Auggie the other day were also tossed to the floor with everything else.<p>

It looked like the place had been ransacked. In fact, if not for the sight of her agent slumped on his knees in the middle of the mess with is back to the door, she would've thought his room had been broken into and searched. As it was, her mind began whirring with the possibilities. Had he walked in on a robbery? Had the authorities been called?

"What do you want? I can feel you standing there staring." The miserable voice broke through her thoughts.

"Auggie - I… what happened?"

Auggie flinched, but didn't turn around. "Joan?"

"What the hell happened here, Auggie? Who -?" It was only just occuring to her that it could have been him. That he could've made this mess. She was having a hard time wrapping her head around the thought.

"Joan… I can't find -" he choked and trailed off. "… anything."

Whether or not he'd made the mess, and Joan had a sinking feeling that he just might have, it was clear that her agent was falling apart. She couldn't fathom why no one on staff had come in to help him yet. That's the whole reason they had put him at a facility with _staff_.

"Sit tight, Auggie. I'm going to find someone."

Joan turned and marched up the hallway, her mouth pressed into a thin straight line. How dare they leave her BLIND agent floudering around in a room full of random objects he couldn't even see. It was dangerous negligence.

She found a desk, and someone with a name tag and immediately asked the question at the front of her mind. "Why does Corporal Anderson's room look like a tornado hit, and why in the world has he been left alone in the middle of it? In case it has escaped your notice, he can't SEE, and though I've spent the last several minutes outside his room, I've yet to see a single staff member come by to help him."

The staff member, "Maggie", according to her name tag, stared placidly back at Joan.

"I'm sorry, Ms…?"

"Sinclair," Joan answered impatiently, using an old alias. Since Auggie was registered as Corporal Anderson, the special ops soldier rather than Mr. Anderson the CIA agent, it was necessary that they not connect her with her husband at the CIA.

"Ms. Sinclair, I assure you that our patients' wellbeing is our first priority. While you may not have seen anyone in the hallway, I guarantee you that there is someone within shouting distance of his room, should Corporal Anderson need assistance."

Just as Joan was about to protest further, Maggie got up and came around the desk. "Let's go see the floor supervisor and find out what's going on."

Joan followed Maggie back down the corridor, silently fuming. She was going to give this supervisor a piece of her mind. Who leaves a blind man alone in the middle of that kind of mess?

Finally, they came to a door just a few down from Auggie's room. It had a plaque declaring it to be the office of the floor's rehabilitation supervisor. The door, which had been left cracked open, had a small window through which Joan could clearly see someone working at a desk.

Maggie rapped lightly on the door and then stuck her head in. "Mrs. Freeman, someone would like a word with you."

Mrs. Freeman stepped into the hallway and held out her hand. "I'm Mrs. Freeman, our third floor rehabilitation supervisor, how can I help you?"

Joan didn't take the offered hand. "I'm wondering why Corporal Anderson's room looks like it's been ransacked, and why he's been left there alone."

Mrs. Freeman looked completely unruffled by Joan's ire. "Ma'am, his room looks like that because he decided to do a little redecorating earlier. It'll be like that until he cleans it up."

"But he's blind!"

"Exactly why he has to clean it up. Imagine how dangerous it is to be blind in the middle of a room where everything's been tossed to the floor."

Before Joan could protest further Mrs. Freeman softened, and gestured for Joan to come into her office. Once they were seated, she explained.

"It's obvious you care for Corporal Anderson, but I want you to know that we're doing the very best we can for him. Yes, he has a rough day today. He decided to take it out on his room. But trust me, Ms. Sinclair, once he calms down and starts using the skills he's already learned, he will be able to pick everything up again and put it where it belongs. It's important that he do this himself, Ma'am.

"Trust me, after he gets through picking up that mess, it'll be a long long time before he even considers tossing his things around again. He needs to find out for himself what it feels like. And more importantly, he needs to know that he _can_ fix this himself. He'll never know how much he can do until he stops feeling sorry for himself and _does_ it."


End file.
